Femtocells—building-based wireless access points interfaced with a wired broadband network—are traditionally deployed to improve indoor wireless coverage, and to offload a mobility radio access network (RAN) operated by a wireless service provider. Improved indoor coverage includes stronger signal and improved reception (e.g., voice, sound, or data), ease of session or call initiation, and session or call retention as well. Offloading a RAN reduces operational and transport costs for the service provider since a lesser number of end users utilizes over-the-air radio resources (e.g., radio frequency channels), which are typically limited. With the rapid increase in utilization of communications networks and/or devices, mobile data communications have been continually evolving due to increasing requirements of workforce mobility, and, services provided by femtocells can be extended beyond indoor coverage enhancement; for example, femtocells can be utilized in areas wherein macro coverage is not poor or weak.
Conventional femtocells enable a user/owner to manage access to femtocell service by manually creating and/or updating access control list(s), or “white list(s).” Typically, such white list(s) can be configured via a networked interface, which facilitates access management to a femtocell. The white list(s) includes a set of subscriber station(s) identifier numbers, codes or tokens, and can also include additional fields for femtocell access management based on desired complexity. Accordingly, the user/owner can update and personalize femto AP autonomously (e.g., free of interaction with technical support entities) at substantially any time. However, manually populating the access list(s) can be tedious for the user/owner.
In addition, the number of persons (e.g., friends and family) to which the user/owner can grant femtocell access is limited, and thus the user/owner has to frequently update the access list(s) to ensure that the appropriate persons are granted access. Frequent manual updates to the access list(s) can be a time-consuming task and can lead to customer dissatisfaction. Moreover, the traditional access list implementation and manual provisioning processes are far too cumbersome to accommodate the functionality that the user/owner desires.